PESHAWAR: A Peshawar High Court bench on Tuesday sought comments from the president’s principal secretary, State and Frontier Region secretary and other respondents on a petition seeking orders for declaring the Federally Administered Tribal Areas a province instead of merging it with Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.

Justice Mohammad Ghazanfar Khan and Justice Mohammad Ayub Khan issued directives in this respect after listening to the preliminary arguments of Noor Alam Khan, lawyer for the petitioner, Daulat Khan Afridi, the Fata president of the Pakistan Justice and Democratic Party.

While seeking their comments on the petition, the bench asked the respondents to inform it about their viewpoint on the issue on the next date of hearing to be fixed afterwards.

Petition opposes merger of tribal areas with KP

The respondents in the petition are the country’s president through his principal secretary, Federation of Pakistan through Safron secretary, Cabinet Division secretary, parliamentary affairs secretary, law and justice secretary, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa chief secretary, Fata Secretariat additional chief secretary and KP Governor through his principal secretary.

The petitioner prayed the court to issue directives to the respondents, including federal government, to respect the will of the people of Fata by abstaining from imposing a decision on them against their will.

He requested that Fata be given a separate status by abstaining from integration with the province of KP.

“A separate legislative system be arranged for Fata by amending the Constitution which could legislate for the people of Fata and to have administrative control of Fata,” he said, adding that adequate provision be made to safeguard the legitimate interests of the people of Fata.

Lawyer Noor Alam Khan said Fata comprised of seven semi-autonomous agencies or administrative units, including Khyber, Mohmand, Bajaur, Kurram, Orakzai, North Waziristan and South Waziristan, as well as Frontier Regions, which adjoin the settled districts, including Peshawar, Kohat, Bannu, Lakki Marwat, Tank and Dera Ismail Khan.

He said Fata was spread over 27,200 square kilometers and was inhabited by around five million people.

The lawyer said after its creation, the country was governed under the Government of India Act, 1935, read with the Indian Independent Act, 1947, before the Constitutions of 1956 and 1962 were enacted.

He added that there followed the abrogation of the Constitution of 1962 and the introduction of the Constitution of 1973 through which special status was given to Fata.

The lawyer said the federal government had constituted a committee on Fata reforms, which had submitted its report recommending the integration and merger of Fata with KP with each agency being declared a separate district.

He said the people of Fata had been deprived of their fundamental rights and without hearing them, a major decision had been made related to their life and liberty.

The lawyer said the people of Fata wanted to have own system to legislate for thems in line with the local customs.

He said there were several benefits of giving status of province to Fata instead of merging it with KP as it would be given its share under the NFC Award.

The lawyer added that currently, eight Senators were elected from Fata and if the tribal areas were merged with KP, the region would lose those eight seats.

Published in Dawn, February 28th, 2018